


Ceasefire

by MsSolo



Series: Detente [2]
Category: Batman (Comics), DCU (Comics)
Genre: Brotherly Bonding, College classes, Coming Out, Gen, preslash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-01
Updated: 2018-08-01
Packaged: 2019-06-19 14:17:27
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,906
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15511677
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MsSolo/pseuds/MsSolo
Summary: "Are you ever coming out of the sofa again?" Cissie asks.Tim considers. "Has everyone in the coffee shop stopped staring?""Most of them."Most isn't good enough. "I think I'll stay here a bit longer."Cissie drapes her jacket over his head, because she is a true friend. It's safe in the dark.





	Ceasefire

**Author's Note:**

> [Canon per tonos](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A41CITk85jk) (which might be nice to listen to while reading), and [M C Escher's Waterfalls](https://www.mcescher.com/gallery/recognition-success/waterfall/).
> 
> More "getting reacquainted" gen between the batboys.

There are a lot of "ifs" making his lecture in time is contingent on. If the traffic is good. If he finds a spot to park in quickly. If the elevator is working for once. If Damian keeps up, and keeps behaving himself.

If all those things, and they make it on time, by the end of the lecture it will officially be the longest he's spent in Damian's company outside of a family holiday. And he has the very weird feeling that it might be okay.

Damian is staring out the window. He's not critiquing Tim's driving or making snide comments about his time keeping. He's suspiciously quiet, in fact, but Tim figures maybe he's still processing the earlier events. He's having a shitty day, and he probably wants to go home and curl up with his pets and some of Alfred's cocoa, but he hasn't objected to being dragged over to Gotham U for a lecture on number theory that frankly Tim would rather skip if his attendance wasn't already so poor. 

Morning classes: a crime against humanity? Debate.

He stopped spending time with Damian when he left for college. Damian had been hell to him in the weeks before the semester started, and he'd finally drawn a line in the sand. He'd see Damian in contexts where the whole family was present, but he didn't want to be alone with him, and he didn't want other people surprising him with Damian's presence. No galas where it was just him and Bruce and Damian. No missions with him and Jason and Damian. No late night pizza runs with him and Dick and Damian. One person was never buffer enough.

It had changed things, of course. He sees less of Bruce (though it seems like everyone's seeing less of him, these days, and Tim's inner stalker is too ready to take up the baton again and try and save him from himself). The first few months had almost destroyed his relationship with Dick, because Dick thought boundaries were another thing he could flip over. Tim had felt unbearably rude every time Dick had surprised him with Damian, walking out of restaurants and turning down case work. But eventually Dick stopped pushing the issue, and apart from the occasional guilt trip he let it go. Tim suspects Damian had a hand in that too, since it was obvious the teen was no happier with Dick's manipulation than he was. His relationship with Dick is slowly healing, and with most of the rest of the family it's unchanged. He's had basically no relationship with Damian for over two years now, and it's been a massive improvement on having a bad relationship with him.

The net result, though, is that now he's sitting next to a stranger. If he tries, he can almost persuade himself that the little voice in the back of his head that keeps insisting Damian is only quiet because he's plotting to undermine him, that he's thinking up ways to belittle him, that he's going to cut the brakes while Tim's in class and send him to a fiery death, is talking about someone else entirely. It couldn't possibly be this serious faced near-adult, who made Tim laugh so hard he thought he was going to pee, and who's staring around the university campus as Tim looks for a parking spot with wide eyes, who looks excited to be here. 

The ifs have it. There's a spot right outside the building (not a handicapped spot, though Tim does still have a permit from when Tim Drake spent a year on crutches) and the elevator is working and Professor Sandringham is thirty seconds late, which gives Tim just enough time to slide into a seat and pull out his tablet. It's a work one, but he can log into the cloud storage he uses for college work on it, so it'll do for today.

Damian sits next to him. After a beat he pulls a notepad from his school bag. Tim wonders of he's going to spend the class sketching. Does Damian still draw? Yes, he gave Bruce a watercolour for his last birthday, though Bruce had skipped the celebrations to analyse the Scarecrow's latest toxin in the cave. Alfred had tutted a lot.

Maybe he should say something to Dick? He can't do it again, not on his own.

The lights click off and [a beautiful strain of music starts to play](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A41CITk85jk). Tim feels Damian sit up straight next to him. The projector lights up with [M C Escher's Waterfall](https://www.mcescher.com/gallery/recognition-success/waterfall/).

The music comes to an end, and the lights come up enough for the professor to see them all, those the front of the hall remains gloomy so the print remains visible on the screen.

"Can anyone tell me the connection between what you heard, and what you saw?"

The hall is silent.

Sandringham sighs.

"Can anyone tell me what you're looking at?"

A girl to Tim's left raises a hand. "Escher," she says.

"Good. And what we heard?"

A boy at the back calls out, "Mozart."

"Tt."

Tim glances at Damian, who looks thoroughly disgusted. His scoff has caught the attention of the professor; arriving so late has put them at the front of the class.

Sandringham raises an eyebrow at them. Tim slouches into his seat, but Damian is positively vibrating next to him.

Tim nudges him with his knee. Damian frowns at him. Tim nods towards the professor. Slowly, still giving Tim a suspicious look, Damian raises his hand.

"Yes?"

"It was Bach's Canon Per Tonos, and in answer to your first question, the connection is the way in which both contrive to change from one thing to another while your attention is on them, while also being a constant loop. Bach's canon modulates with each repetition to increasingly remote provinces of tonality until on the sixth step it returns to the original key of C, beginning the endlessly rising loop again. The water in Escher's painting flows in six steps in an endlessly falling loop. It's one theme in two mediums."

The room turns as one to regard the stranger in their midst. Sandringham grins.

"Yes! You're a musician?"

Damian nods.

He is, Tim remembers. Alfred puts all of Damian's public performances into the family calendar, though Tim has never been to one. He played violin for them at Alfred's last birthday, though, and Tim had a vague idea he plays something else too. Piano? Somehow it never occurred to Tim that Damian might actually enjoy it.

Damian really is a stranger to him now. A stranger he's increasingly interested in getting to know.

The professor throws some technical terms at Damian, who bats them back with something about medieval rounds, and Sandringham beams at him. The lecture moves on to how Escher and Bach are visual and auditory versions of what they're doing with number theory this week. The back and forth, round and round, faster and slower - they're all loops, like programming loops, and when Tim reframes it like that he starts to grasp some of what Sandringham is going on about.

He maps his thoughts out on the tablet, scribbling down snatches of the lecture and noting things to look up later. Next to him Damian's pencil barely leaves the page. He's taking down line after line, in places word for word what the professor is saying, in others exploring his own thoughts on it. There's a crease between his eyes and his tongue comes out a couple of times when he's really concentrating. Tim wonders if he can bring Damian to every lecture to take notes for him. His handwriting is impeccable.

The lights come back up to full brightness and people start to file out of the room. Damian packs up his school bag and stands awkwardly next to Tim, who's taking his time while the room empties. He's clutching his notepad to his chest like it contains something precious. 

Tim smiles at him. This is his little brother, a high school junior who just showed up an entire auditorium of college sophomores. Some people are still staring at Damian as they leave, but the person who's paying them the most attention is the professor. Well, maybe Tim can earn himself some brownie points.

#

Damian follows Tim down the steps to the podium. He wonders if Tim is going to apologise to the professor for bringing Damian. He hadn't been able to restrain himself from answering more of the Professor's questions. He'd got one wrong, too, which was a novel experience. Maybe Tim wants him to apologise in person for disrupting the lecture, like his teachers do whenever he interrupts them.

"Ah, our musician. And Tom..."

"Tim Drake," Tim says. Unlike earlier, he seems completely unbothered at someone getting his name wrong. "Computer Science major."

"Unusual class for CompSci. Did you do the background reading?"

Tim shrugs. "Some of it. I'm keeping up, I think."

"And you? What are you studying?"

Damian doesn't know how to reply. He looks to Tim for a sign.

Tim grins. "This is my little brother, Damian."

"A freshman? Haven't chosen your major yet?"

"High school," Damian says. "Junior."

The professor takes a step back and looks him up and down. Damian stands up straight.

"You kept up," the professor says. "You... Well, all I can say is I'm very impressed. Did _you_ do the background reading?"

Damian shakes his head. "I would appreciate a copy of the reading list, if you have one to hand. Today's lecture was very stimulating, and I wish to explore the ideas further."

"Of course." The professor rifles through a file on the podium and pulls out a slightly tattered sheet of paper. "Most of the books are available through the library. I suppose your brother can check them out for you. Shouldn't you be in school right now?"

"Not right now, no," Tim interjects, before Damian has to decide how to reply to that. "He's shadowing me today."

"Careful," the professor says. "Your shadow is going to outshine you."

And Tim smiles at that.

Suddenly it falls into place. Tim is showing him off. Tim is proud of him, and wants people to know they're related. Tim _wants_ to be outshone by him.

Damian squeezes his notepad tighter to his chest while he processes this.

The room is filling up again, and Tim puts a hand in the small of Damian's back, just enough pressure to get him walking. Damian lets his brother steer him out of the lecture theatre and down the corridor.

"Is it always like this?" Damian asks, chin resting on the top of his notepad.

"Is what always like what?"

"College. Like... this?" Damian lets go of the notepad to gesture around them, then quickly returns his hand to its place. These are his college notes, that he took in a college lecture, and his college reading list. "So stimulating?"

Tim grins at him. "Not always, but some times. It's a hell of a lot better than high school."

"Do you have any more lectures today?"

"You know, I kinda wish I did. Especially one of Tendring's. He's so self-important and the students are so... so worthy. Being taken down a peg or two by a high schooler would really shake them all out of their complacency. Of course randomisation is the best way to trial social programs, I don't know why we need six weeks on it!"

Damian hasn't been challenged by a teacher since his days in the League, when his mother hired tutors who would really push him. There was no such thing as learning too fast, then, or ideas beyond his scope, or not making the rest of the class feel bad. At high school he's the complacent one, but he can't imagine that here, even if Tim's telling the truth about six weeks on the same concept. It has to be a more interesting concept, more thoroughly explored, than anything at the academy. It has to be, because this is college.

He has never wanted anything more in his life than to go to college. Right now.

His father will never allow it, of course.

If his shoulders slump a little, it's because he allows them to. He chooses now to put away his notes because it's a convenient moment, waiting for the elevator, not because they're symbolic of his already crushing disappointment. And if his eyes sting a little, and his breath catches in his throat, it's probably because they're down the hall from the labs and some kind of invisible, odorless gas is in their vicinity. Because he's sure that's the sort of thing chemistry majors get to make at college, rather than dipping stupid paper into stupid liquids and watching it turn stupid colours to show if it's a stupid acid or a stupid alkali.

"You can take college classes in your senior year at Gotham Academy, you know," Tim says. "I bet if we applied the right kind of pressure, they'd let you take a couple now."

Damian is scared to admit out loud how much he wants that. What if Tim doesn't? What if he's only showing Damian off as a one time thing? He won't want his baby brother trailing after him like a duckling all the time. Damian doesn't want to trail _after Drake._

__

__

He nods, but doesn't otherwise reply to Drake's suggestion.

Drake frowns. "Are you tired? I've got a study group meeting next, but if you want I can skip it and take you home."

"No, I am fine." Damian forces a smile. "I would not want to take you away from your meeting."

"Well, if you're sure. I mean, we don't actually get a lot of studying done. They do a nice chai at the coffee place, though. I mean, so I'm told. You'll know for sure."

Damian's stomach betrays him with an audible reminder than he missed lunch waiting outside the headmaster's office.

"And there's muffins the size of your head," Drake adds.

"Tt, well. If there's muffins," Damian says.

The coffee place does do a decent chai, for an American establishment, and though the muffin isn't quite as large as Drake claims it's still enough to satisfy his ever growing body. Pistachio and pomegranate, with rose water icing.

They have arrived before Drake's friends and claimed a U of sofas in the corner. Drake is downloading files onto his tablet and Damian gets some homework out of his bag to catch up on.

"Ooh, new boy toy? Introductions, Timmy!"

A tall blond boy throws himself onto the free sofas. He's well dressed, a mix of expensive modern items and vintage pieces, with a reporter's notepad sticking out of his shirt pocket. He steals a piece of Damian's muffin.

Damian doesn't like him.

"Bern _ie_ , this is my little brother, Damian. Damian, Bernie."

"Ber _nard_ ," the blond introduces himself, holding out a hand sticky with stolen goods. Damian takes it and squeezes, just a little too hard to be polite. "I didn't know you have a brother, Tim." Bernard takes his hand back, wincing slightly.

"I acquired him, and the rest of them, when I became a Wayne," Tim says. "And stop looking at me like that; you stole his food."

Bernard grins and sits back on his chosen sofa, crossing one leg over the other and stretching his arms along the back.

"Another socialite! I hope you're more social than your brother, Dames." Bernard takes the notepad from his pocket and a pen from behind his ear. He taps the pen to his lips, thoughtfully. "Damian Wayne sits opposite me, perfectly composed. One gets the impression he doesn't care to do anything he can't do perfectly. He pins me with his steely... no, jade. Jadey? Gimlet eyes? What colour is a gimlet, Tim?"

"A gimlet, as in the gaze, is a tool used for boring holes in things, so metal coloured, I guess? The cocktail is green," Tim says. He glances at Damian. "Bernard is majoring in journalism," he explains.

Bernard grins. "I'm going to be a celebrity gossip columnist."

"That's the only reason he hangs out with us." The wry voice belongs to a woman, who sits down next to Tim. She's a leggy blonde, classically attractive, and irritatingly familiar. "Cissie King-Jones."

"Damian Wayne."

The name is familiar too, but in a different way to her face.

"The youngest Wayne. It's nice to finally meet you." She shoots Tim a sideways glance that's impossible to miss. Damian assumes it's for his benefit, but he's out of his depth. He's beginning to wish he'd had Drake just take him home. Titus doesn't shoot people meaningful glances. Well, not unless they have food. "What brings you to our little study group?"

Damian is tired of skirting the truth. "I was suspended for punching a fellow student at school."

Cissie smiles at him. "We've all been there," she says.

"We have not!" Bernard stares at her. "Also, when? Why don't I know about this?"

"That whole thing with the Amazons," Cissie says.

Damian blinks at her, remembers a picture that used to sit in Drake's room. An impossibly young Robin, an alien with sunglasses and a pierced ear, a boy all hair and goggles, a girl in a wig, a ghost, and Cissie King-Jones dressed like a cheerleader in the least convincing mask Damian ever saw.

Does Bernard know she's Arrowette? Does he know Drake's Red Robin? Surely Tim would have warned him.

"The boy deserved it," Drake says, recapturing Damian's attention. "The school were worse than useless about it. They're too used to Bruce just throwing money at them. I half suspect they have been mismanaging the whole situation to ensure they can summon various parents to act as benefactors whenever the coffers come up short. It's little short of blackmail, and I didn't see why I should be expected to play along. They were expecting Brucie to come along and make it go away. They weren't expecting, well-" Drake laughs coldly. "They weren't expecting Janet Drake's son."

"I never met your mother," Bernard says, cocking his head to one side. Damian is curious too. He hasn't thought much about Tim's birth parents, beyond their deaths. It's hard to imagine a whole family of Drakes.

"She didn't suffer fools gladly," Tim says, lips curling up in a humourless smile. "I was terrified of her as a child, but admired her, too. She worked in a male dominated field, and she never let anyone disrespect her. My teachers lived in dread of parents' evening." He reaches up, tugging on his long hair. "She certainly wouldn't have let this grow more than a couple of inches. If she were still alive I'd be studying law at Harvard, probably."

"Ugh, you'd make an amazing lawyer, too. You'd think circles around the defence." Bernard reached over and tweaked a loose strand of Tim's hair. "Can't picture you without the hipster do, these days."

"He thought circles around Hammer," Damian says. "It was enjoyable to watch."

"I'll bet. Go on, Tim Drake attorney at law, give us an example. I'll be Principal Spanner." Bernard raises a finger and wags it at Damian. "Young Wayne is a very naughty boy. Whatever shall I do with him."

Tim groans and buries his face in his hands. For a moment Damian thinks he won't play along, but when he raises his head again that cold look is in his eyes.

""If you don't have a zero tolerance bullying policy, then what you have is a tolerating bullying policy. Tell me, headmaster, what did you think was going to happen when you called me here?"

Cissie and Bernard both stare at Tim. Damian feels that warm bubble in his chest again, the one that he's starting to accept is pride in his brother. This man is on his side. His ally.

"Oh my god," Bernard says. "That's not your mom's voice. That's your bossy sex voice."

Tim freezes.

"No?"

"Yes. 'Tell me, Bernard, what did you think was going to happen?'"

Bernard's impression is uncanny.

"No. No no no."

"I'm not going to forget that voice in a hurry, believe me. I still have that voicemail."

"I do not sound like my _mother_ during _sex_." Tim's voice hits the top of its range and cracks. Other customers are turning to look at them. Tim's face is blotchy, some patches scarlet with embarrassment, others white with shock. He lets out a wordless groan and turns in the seat to bury his face in the sofa cushions next to Cissie's legs.

Cissie and Bernard are howling with laughter. Damian is frozen. He doesn't know what to do with this new information. Of course he knew there was a good chance his college aged brother has sex, but knowing that and knowing... knowing it is someone here, next to him, that is different. Much less theoretical. Much more visceral. _Tell me, Damian, what did you think was going to happen when a child like you followed me to college?_

"Are you Tim's boyfriend?" he asks Bernard. He knows as soon as the words leave his mouth it was a mistake to say them. Boyfriend is such a childish word. He should have asked if they were lovers. Or maybe asking anything at all is what betrays his naivete. He doesn't know. He knows he's done something wrong, because they're staring at him, but he doesn't know what.

He tears another piece off his muffin, and with each piece he picks off he makes a wish for ninjas. Hundreds of ninjas, sent by his grandfather, to kill him on the spot. It's the only way out of this situation he can see.

#

Even through the roar of blood in his ears Tim hears his friends fall silent.

Fuck.

He's not keeping his sexuality a secret, exactly, but he's not had a lot of conversations about it. It's definitely news to Damian. Damian who's been the subject of homophobic bullying for too long.

Gaymian.

A giggle escapes his lips. He hopes it's muffled by the pillow. If he loses it now, he's gone. Hysteria will set in. He can feel it creeping up on him like Joker toxin. He's just been outed to his brother because Bernard can't tell the difference between Tim being clear and specific about what he wants in the bedroom and Tim bitching out Damian's headmaster.

"Ummmmm."

Oh god, he needs to say something before Bernard does.

"We hooked up a couple of times," he says, turning his face enough that the words aren't swallowed by the cushions, but his face is still hidden. "For obvious reasons, it's literally never ever happening again." He punctuates this by kicking Bernard under the coffee table.

"Yeah, because he was too bossy."

Tim tries to kick him again, but Bernard's moved, the bastard, and Tim makes the whole table jolt instead. The others scramble to rescue their notes and gadgets from sloshed coffee.

"We are _not_ having this conversation in front of my baby brother," he says. "He's, like, ten."

"I'm sixteen," Damian protests hotly.

"For the purposes of _this_ argument, you are ten, and Bernard is a terrible no good pervy old man who you should never, _ever_ listen to."

"Are you ever coming out of the sofa again?" Cissie asks.

Tim considers. "Has everyone in the coffee shop stopped staring?"

"Most of them."

Most isn't good enough. "I think I'll stay here a bit longer."

Cissie drapes her jacket over his head, because she is a true friend. It's safe in the dark.

"Maybe," Cissie says, "now might be a good time to actually do some studying, as a study group. Is there anything you're working on, Damian?"

Tim hears papers shuffling.

"I am up to date with most of my subjects. I will have ample time while suspended from school to complete the rest. What are you majoring in, Miss King-Jones?"

"French literature."

"What made you choose that?"

"A combination of things. A film I worked on in Paris. The French archery team at the Olympics. The fact my mother doesn't speak a word of it, which means she can't get insert herself into my degree like she does the rest of my life."

Cissie and Damian continue to make polite conversation. They've both got pleasant voices, Cissie's a sweet contralto and Damian's, now it's mostly settled, a warm bass. Tim is warm and comfortable and Cissie's jacket smells like bowstring wax and vanilla shampoo. It's been a long day, and he's missed at least two of his normal complement of coffees.

Light forces itself through his eyelids, which he was definitely only resting. He groans and makes grabby hands for Cissie's jacket.

"Sorry, Tim, but I need it. Bernard got you another coffee."

Tim's body hauls itself up into something vaguely approximating sitting, hands groping blindly for the promised nectar. His fingers find warm ceramic and curl around it, pulling the precious liquid towards him.

"Are his eyes still shut?" Damian's voice isn't nearly so pleasant now it's not lulling Tim to sleep. He resents it.

"He'll start functioning again soon. It was lovely to meet you, Damian. I hope we haven't scared you off."

"It has been very... enlightening."

Cissie laughs. "Oh, there's plenty more we can enlighten you about, if you come back. I really am pleased to have finally met you; I've heard plenty of stories from the Titans."

"Ah. Yes."

"Some of them were even good."

"Were they the ones where I wasn't there?"

"One day, if you play nice, I'll tell you about Mr Sarcastic."

"You will _not._ " Tim is awake now. "You've done enough damage as it is." He blinks around. "When did Bernard leave? I meant him to hear that too."

"About an hour ago. He's got someone else's bossy sex voice to listen to."

"I remind you again, baby brother." Tim darts his eyes pointedly at Damian.

"I remind you," Damian says, "sixteen year old brother. Nearly seventeen."

"Anyway, I need to head out as well. Stay sweet, boys."

She leaves with a little wave. Tim watches Damian watch her leave.

Tim drains the rest of his coffee, aware now that it's cold, which is probably a clue that Bernard has been gone a while. Ra's wouldn't call him a great detective if he could see him now, waking up from an afternoon nap.

It had been a really nice nap. He should do that more often.

"What time is it?" Tim yawns, jaw cracking.

"Six," says Damian. "You slept for almost two hours."

"Ugh. I'm so sorry, Damian. I should have just taken you home."

"I had a pleasant time."

"Seemed like you and Cissie were getting on well."

Damian nods. He's acquired another giant muffin at some point, and he's picking at it. His attention is focused on it like it's one of Nygma's puzzles. Tim tries not to smirk at him, but it's hard.

"Is she your sexual partner? Now or in the past?"

"No. Cissie and I haven't ever hooked up." Tim steals a pistachio from Damian's muffin. "I'm gay, Damian."

Damian nods. He carefully extracts pistachio and pomegranate seeds from a piece of muffin, and eats the cake that's left.

"I apologise that you had to endure... earlier. Hammer's archaic attitudes. I am sorry if they offended you."

"You don't have anything to apologise for, Damian, unless you share them."

Damian's eyes flash, a startling shade of green, but at least he's found the courage to meet Tim's eyes.

"Rest assured, I do not," Damian says.

"Well then." Tim steals another pistachio from the pile Damian has built on his plate. "Cissie's a bit old for you."

Damian glares at him. "I'm saving those."

"Huh? Oh, sorry."

"And I am not interested in Cissie, beyond a shared interest in projectiles, and some literature." Damian pushes the pile of pomegranate seeds towards Tim. "You can eat those."

"Thank you." He doesn't like them as much as the pistachios, but he's hungry, and he appreciates the gesture.

"Bernard is nice also," Damian says. "I admire his physique."

"Bernard is _not_ nice." Tim isn't sure what to say about the other comment. Bernard's physique is pretty admirable, at least for the standards of most of the population, who don't get their exercise scrambling across roof tops. It's nice to touch skin that's not covered in scars. "He's too old for you too."

A small smile touches the edges of Damian's lips. Tim lets out a breath he didn't realise he was holding. Apparently it's not easier having someone come out to you from this side, either. Why does it all have to be so fraught?

Damian eats the rest of his muffin and moves on to his pile of pistachios. Tim chucks the pomegranate seeds into his mouth in one handful, and chews. What he really wants is another coffee, a hot one, but they should probably be moving.

"Do you want to drive the Ferrari?" Tim asks.

Damian chokes on a pistachio nut.

"Really?"

"You started driving even younger than I did," Tim says. "I trust you. Also, there's a non-zero chance I will fall asleep behind the wheel."

Damian scoffs, but he's smiling. "You may finish the pistachios, if you wish." 

From Damian, that's effusive gratitude. Even Tim knows that.

**Author's Note:**

> So, once upon a time I was at a party and this drunk girl raved at me about a book that changed her life: [Godel Escher Bach](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G%C3%B6del,_Escher,_Bach), by Douglas R Hofstadter. So, what else could I do but buy it? Of course, I've never studied art, or music, or number theory, or programming, or formal logic, or neurology, or... Put it this way, it's several years later and I'm still only a third through. But even if I have to read every chapter twice, it still makes me feel so much smarter than anything else I've encountered. And, like cute drunk girls at a college party, Damian and Tim would fucking love it.


End file.
